Visions of War
by LiquidxLollipop
Summary: What happens when the spells stop flying and the bodies stop falling? How can one ever wash away the blood of the fallen?


Harry stood in the doorway of the Entrance Hall, surveying the damage the final battle had wrought on the school. Seeing the destruction and chaos that filled the school and the grounds hurt something deep in the young man's heart. This had been his first real home; the first place he had felt safe, even with all of it's dangers and adventures.

Moving slowly, as though in a daze, the Savior moved into the Great Hall, looking over the mayhem there. It had been turned into a makeshift hospital. Here were the injured, dying, and already dead. Those that could be moved were being transported to St. Mungo's, those who were too far gone to be helped were being made comfortable or being prepared for the funeral rites.

So much death. So much pain. So much had gone wrong.

He saw the faces of those that were lost. Friends. Family. Strangers. Old. Young. All the same and all trapped in Death's cold hands.

Standing there he could see the Weasley family all kneeling around Fred, Ron gripping at his trousers crying and begging him to wake up. Molly knelt at his head, running her hands through his hair, tears streaming down her face. Hermione sat next to Ron, rubbing his back as tears flowed down her face. The rest of the clan of red-heads gathered around, even Percy crouched there in tears, apologizing over and over, babbling about how he truly loved Fred. The sight was more than Harry could bear and it ate him alive as he forced himself to watch the devastation his very existence had caused.

Harry could feel himself breaking; could feel his sanity slipping away at the sight of all those that he had been unable to save. Those that had given their lives to win a war started by a mad man; lives given, ultimately, in service to him. Their blood was on his hands. Their sacrifices and their deaths were a mark on his very soul that he knew to his very core would never fade. He may be able to wash the dirt and grime off of his body, but never their blood; never could the weight of their deaths be removed from his shoulders.

He felt more than heard the approach of feet, his body and magic so hypersensitive due to over use. The thought that magic dulled with overuse was a very wrong one, at least for him. His magical core was exhausted and it hurt. The overused magic was like a raw, exposed nerve; every brush of another's power was like an electric jolt. His power almost crackled in the air around him, wild and beyond control. He felt like a stripped live wire, power arching between his fingers as electricity would between wires.

"Harry..." Said a voice, unusually soft to his ears.

"Professor McGonegoll..." He replied, his voice empty, almost cold.

"You need to be seen." She said, almost gently. "You're injured too."

"Not until they are cared for." He said, the detachment in his voice growing with every word. There was no need to ask who 'they' were, the Headmistress knew.

She had spent so many years watching over Harry, the bravest of all her Lions. She knew that he would not budge; he would stand there and refuse assistance until all of the injured had been tended, whether he, himself, bled to death or not. He was a selfless person to the core. That selflessness had almost gotten him killed. The normally stern woman's heart clenched at the memory of Hagrid carrying Harry's small, seemingly broken body to the castle. The sight of him lying on the ground, thinking him to be lost... the feeling was indescribable. She loved all those in her house and under her care, but Harry was special, always had been.

Minerva had watched him grow from a scared little boy into a brave young man. She had been forced to stand aside, year after year, as the Albus had thrust the weight of the world onto his much too small shoulders. No one else could have survived. No one else could have shouldered the burdens Dumbledore had seen fit to put on this boy. Harry had been her favorite always, he was the son to her that she never had a chance to have. If she lived a thousand years, the vision of him dead would haunt her. It had been her nightmare for years and in that moment in time, her fears had been made real. She would never forgive Albus the damage he had done to Harry. Necessary for the Greater Good or no, she would never forgive the pain inflicted on her bravest of Lions until her dying breath.

"Then let me bandage you until you can be seen." Minerva said, forcing a sternness to her voice that would brook no argument. "If you must be stubborn then you will at least survive to be stubborn." She chastised, pleased to see a small, barely there spark of amusement in those green eyes, once so vibrant, now dull with the visions of war.

"Will the screaming ever stop?" Harry asks absently, his eyes unseeing as he stared out at the sea of injured.

"I do not know, Harry." his Professor replied. "I will let you know if it does in my own ears."


End file.
